“Unapologetic, reinforced, and vibrant,” Adonis Alessi said, describing himself in just three words.

Alessi’s journey begins in 2012 with a boy named Nick Williams.

“Music for me all started when I was 17 years old, what had happened was four days after my birthday on October 24, 2012, I almost lost my dad in a car accident,” said Alessi “He barely made it out alive, but at that time, almost losing a parent, that’s really difficult. We were dealing with a lot of family drama that led me to get anxiety really bad, but in a way my mental health was affected. At the time we were super poor.

So really the only way to weed myself out of the drama was by music. I started listening to a bunch of different artists, I started playing around with the piano, and I just started writing my own song lyrics. After a lot of trial and error and trying to write music, something just clicked into me and I started writing a lot of songs.

After about a few months I started taking songwriting seriously and making music seriously. After that it started this huge change in me I started becoming a lot more happier.”

It was around that time that Adonis was born. Not in the fresh out of the womb type sense, but in the reborn kind of way.

“Adonis is from the greek word meaning handsome lord,” said Alessi “I chose the name because it’s kind of like a heart in my sleeve kind of thing. I never considered myself handsome or attractive growing up because people kept making fun of my size since I was overweight. After I got out of high school, I stopped telling myself I was a misshapen and started loving myself more. So I use Adonis as a way to tell people I’m happy with how I am, inside and out.”

Adonis also stars as a character for Alessi’s music. Similar to an alter ego, but Adonis’ only difference is there’s  nothing altered about him. Adonis is just a free being that mirrors Nick Williams in every shape and form.

“With my music it kind follows a storyline. I kind of associate Adonis as a characterization of myself or I guess like an alliance,” said Alessi “Like some of the songs are theatricalized, but they are all pertaining to an experience I’ve had or an experience I want to or don’t want to have.”

Other artists who have taken on different personas through their music are part of the reason why Alessi created Adonis. They stand as an inspiration.

“It kind of follows the same style as Marina and the DIamonds. She has had an album called electra heart where she plays a character, and like Melanie Martinez with her album cry baby where she plays crybaby who is basically herself,” said Alessi “Melanie was a huge inspiration for the direction I have wanted the album to go into. It’s a very personal album for me because it goes into quite a lot of life events that i’ve gone through and some I haven’t yet and want to go through.”

Alessi used music as a form of therapy. Using his talents, he released a lot of the tension he had built inside of him through art.

“The thing I love about music is the things I hate talking about in person I can easily fluently speak within my words in my music and that’s like the biggest source of therapy for me,” said Alessi “It’s like the best outlet ever.”

Alessi’s song style can be compared to that of Adele, Lady Gaga, and Ali X who is a songwriter that has also written for Troye sivan and Britney Spears.

“I consider myself to be an alternative pop artist, and I really relate my lyrics to the style of Adele or Troye Sivan who are genuinely honest and emotionally raw,” said Alessi.

Most music nowadays can not be generalized into one specific category. That same stigma that encompasses individuality and unique quality applies to Alessi’s music. However, if the star were to match his style to one genre, the closest in comparison would be pop music.

“I feel like my music it’s kind of like pop music, but it’s also not. It’s not like garbage pop, cookie cutter, like, ‘Oh I just did a bitch with my gucci flip flops.’ I’m not that egotistical anymore,” said Alessi “What I want people to get out of my music is to understand who I am and what i’ve gone through. I just want to be relatable, and have relatable music that’s authentic and genuinely myself.”

When asked about being himself, and what pride meant to him, Alessi answered beautifully.

“That is the million dollar question,” said Alessi “I think for me self acceptance was like the hardest thing to grasp the concept of just because I was closeted until I turned 20, so just until 2015 I hated who I was. After I stopped caring what I thought about it and what others thought about it and just started loving who I was and accepting who I was, that really impacted me in a positive way. It changed me for the best.

Having pride is just being able to love who you are and accept who you are and not having to lie about who you are.”

It was at this point in the interview that I almost started crying. Being able to witness a strong artist who was so sure of themselves and vibrant made it clear to me that pride’s definition was physically evident in Alessi. Alessi is to not only empowering, soulful, and motivating toward Tulsa’s music scene but to the overall human race.

“Pride is just about knowing who you are and recognizing the positives in you and how you can be a positive source in other people who are lacking it in themselves,” said Alessi.

Alessi carries a symbol on his body, above his left elbow, that holds sentimental value to the artist.

“This crown tattoo on my left arm is my first tattoo I got when I was 20,” said Alessi “I got this the day I came out of the closet.

The crown symbolises the genuine love, respect, loyalty, and maturity that I want in another person. I want that saying to go for me as well. The initials under here, I.H, are special for the album I am going to be releasing for the next five years.”

So we can all look forward to new releases by the amazing virtuoso Adonis Alessi.

“For the album the standard version has 14 songs and the deluxe or the extended version has 20,” said Alessi “The album has been done for like half a year now. I already have my first and second EP and my first album are all written. They just need to be recorded.”

Works in progress that I, personally, am excited to hear. For anyone else who does not think they can wait that long to hear new music from Alessi, the singer performs locally all over Tulsa.

“Gypsy is basically my second home, I perform there all the time,” said Alessi “The fur shop, the yeti, the beehive lounge, other than that sometimes I’ll perform for art shows or something downtown.”

For more information on upcoming Adonis Alessi events you can follow him on Facebook @Nick Williams, or listen to some of his tracks now on soundcloud @adonis alessi. Also, follow him on instagram @adonisalessi.